By Gavin Whyte
Guest Writer for Wake Up World

Okay, I know the title is a little odd but hear me out, because what I have to say about dying only makes living all the more incredible.

We have been conditioned not to think about death and dying. If we do think about it and voice our thoughts then people, our family and close friends especially, might get a little worried, fearing for our mental health.

But what if — and this is where we make the grim reaper look like prince charming — what if by understanding death and how it’s connected to life, we learn how to live in peace, joy, wonder and love? Have you ever wondered whether all those things we’re seeking might be hiding in the very place we fear the most?

We often speak of the importance of the elements of surrender, faith, flow and trust. We have been asked the difference between faith and trust, and we are happy to clarify that for you.

Faith is the belief that there is something that exists that is bigger than you. It does not matter if you call it God, or Source, or Creator, or Goddess. You could even simply call it “more” if you do not know exactly what you believe. Faith is simply the acknowledgement that there is something vaster than your individuated aspect of self.

Trust is the belief that not only is there something bigger than you, that bigger something has your back. ~Archangel Gabriel

http://trinityesoterics.com/2015/11/24/daily-message-tuesday-november-24-2015/

God said:

As natural as life is, life often feels strange to you.

There is an old song called Stranger in Paradise. Stranger in Paradise is not the Truth of you. You are no stranger to paradise. You are a stranger on Earth. Paradise is plenty familiar to you. And, yet, here you are with a role to play for a while on Earth.

In truth, you are not a Stranger on Earth either. Everyone you meet, you already know. You don’t consciously remember. Nevertheless, you react.

Anything is possible in Earth. There have been so many lives, and so many stories, and not one the same. So many people, one after the other, and no two personalities alike. And, yet, each of the variations are One with Me, just as you are One with Me.

Life on Earth is a paradox. On Earth, everything has gradations, and everything has its opposite or many opposites. The Earth is a land of opposites. And so We have words like near and far, right-side-up and upside-down, now and then, and why and why not. Earth is many-layered everywhere you look. Earth is a foreign land. Paradise is where you come from. Paradise is where you have mostly lived and gone to school. Paradise is the is school everyone went to first and majored in. On Earth, there are multitude kinds of terrain.

By Ben Swann
Guest Writer for Wake Up World

The world’s attention is fixed on Paris. France is a police state. There is concern over ISIS infiltrating Syrian refugees. And of course, the big question, how will the world rid itself of the Islamic State?

But before you listen to one more politician tell you what we need to do, you need to know what politicians knew about ISIS three years ago and the actions they still took…

Reality Check

It is one of the most viral discussions on the internet right now — “the U.S. and its allies must stop ISIS.”

After the Paris attacks that left 129 dead, more than 350 people injured and an entire nation in lock down, ISIS recorded a new video claiming that they will soon strike the United States, specifically Washington D.C.

It would seem that among the readers of Collective Evolution there is a very clear sense that “something is off” that germinated at an early age.  This prompted a search amid dissatisfaction with conventional belief systems.

My good friend Michael Jeffreys, who runs what was the Santa Monica Eckhart Tolle meetup but is now a more general Advaita-oriented satsang in Los Angeles, talks about this often, and lists many areas in which he searched looking for answers until Eckhart’s books and his own quest led him to a recognition that conceptual analytic “truth” is always off.

I have benefited greatly from my association with Michael, mainly in terms of peeling away the many unrecognized layers of beliefs and concepts that I took for granted.

In my own case, this resulted from a sort of reconciliation with three disparate but in my view congruent traditions—cognitive therapy, the Gurdjieff tradition, and Eastern thought and what is now commonly called Advaita or Nonduality.

Welcome to Sun in Sagittarius! Sun in Jupiter’s sign brings a jovial, uplifting, abundant, expansive feel to mundane affairs. While Jupiter, the minor Sun, has plenty of enjoyable characteristics that help to usher in the holiday season, caution is advised in assuming that he has no undesirable qualities! I can say from personal experience that a Jupiter transit coincided with weight gain, and I couldn’t shake the pounds until Jupiter changed signs.

Jupiter in Virgo (which we are experiencing right now) is such an interesting case. The more I think about Jupiter in the earthy Virgo sign, the more I like him there. Jupiter is in classical detriment in Virgo. Virgo is a very analytical, grounded, detail-oriented sign, and Jupiter is more abstract, philosophical, and likes the big picture. Thus Jupiter has trouble squeezing into the Virgo sign! If you can manage do to so, Jupiter in Virgo is a fantastic opportunity to see both “the forest and the trees”. How powerful to be able to see both the big picture and the details within it. I also like Jupiter a bit muted by sign. He is still Jupiter, but not prone to excesses.